Description

Used to show all Articles that have been tagged as Featured. Articles are shown in a Blog Layout.

A Blog Layout in Joomla! has 3 main areas: Leading, Intro, and Links. These are shown in the diagram below.

Articles in the Leading Area always display in one column, using the full display width. Articles in the Intro Area may display in one, two, or three columns, depending on the Columns setting. The parameters below control the number of Articles in each area and the order in which they display. If an Article has a "Read more..." break, only the text before the break (called the Intro Text) will display, along with a "Read more..." link.

Screenshot

Column Headers

Common Options

See Menu Item Manager: New Menu Item for help on fields common to all Menu Item types, including Details, Link Type Options, Page Display Options, Metadata Options, and Module Assignments for this Menu Item.

Layout Options

The Featured Articles Layout has the following Layout Options, as shown below.

Select Categories. Select the categories you want to include in this layout. Use Ctrl+Click to select more than one category. Use Shift+Click to select a range of categories.

# Leading Articles. Number of Articles to show using the full width of the main display area. "0" means that no Articles will show when using the full width. If an Article has a "Read more..." break, only the part of the text before the break (the Intro text) will display. Leave blank to use the default value from the component options.

# Intro Articles. Determines the number of Articles to display after the leading Article. These Articles will display in the number of columns set in the Columns parameter below. If an Article has a "Read more..." break, only the text before the break (Intro text) will display, followed by a "Read more..." link. The order order in which to display the articles is determined by the Category Order and Article Order parameters below. Leave blank to use the default value from the component options.

# Columns. The number of columns to use in the Intro Text area. This is normally between 1 and 3 (depending on the template you are using). If 1 is used, the Into Text Articles will display using the full width of the display area, just like the Leading Articles. Leave blank to use the default value from the component options.

# Links. The number of Links to display in the 'Links' area of the page. These links allow a User to link to additional Articles, if there are more Articles than can fit on the first page of the Blog Layout. Leave blank to use the default value from the component options.

Multi Column Order. In multi-column blog layouts, whether to order articles Down the columns or Across the columns.

Use Global: Use the value from the component options screen.

Down: Order articles going down the first column and then over to the next column, for example:

article 1

1 (continued)

article 2

article 4

article 3

article 5

Across: Order articles going across the columns and then back to the first column, for example:

article 1

1 (continued)

article 2

article 3

article 4

article 5

Category Order. Order of Categories in this Layout. The following options are available.

Use Global: Use the default value from the component options screen.

No Order: Articles are ordered only by the Article Order, without regard to Category.

Title Alphabetical: Categories are displayed in alphabetical order (A to Z)

Title Reverse Alphabetical: Categories are displayed in reverse alphabetical order (Z to A)

Category Manager Order: Categories are ordered according to the Order column entered in the Category Manager.

Article Order. Order of articles in the Featured Articles Layout. The following options are available.

Most recent first: Articles are displayed starting with the most recent and ending with the oldest.

Oldest first: Articles are displayed starting with the oldest and ending with the most recent.

Title Alphabetical: Articles are displayed by Title in alphabetical order (A to Z)

Title Reverse Alphabetical: Articles are displayed by Title in reverse alphabetical order (Z to A)

Author Alphabetical: Articles are displayed by Author in alphabetical order (A to Z)

Author Reverse Alphabetical: Articles are displayed by Author in reverse alphabetical order (Z to A)

Most Hits: Articles are displayed by the number of hits, starting with the one with the most hits and ending with the one with the least hits

Least Hits: Articles are displayed by the number of hits, starting with the one with the least hits and ending with the one with the most hits

Article Manager Order: Articles are ordered according to the Order column entered in the Article Manager.

Date for Ordering. The date used when articles are sorted by date. The following options are available.

Use Global: Use the default value from the component options screen.

Created: Use the article created date.

Modified: Use the article modified date.

Published: Use the article start publishing date.

Pagination. Hide or Show Pagination support. Pagination provides page links at the bottom of the page that allow the User to navigate to additional pages. These are needed if the Articles will not fit on one page. An example is shown below.

The following options are available.

Use Global: Use the default value from the component options screen.

Auto: Pagination links shown if needed.

Show: Pagination links shown if needed.

Hide: Pagination links not shown. Note: In this case, Users will not be able to navigate to additional pages.

Pagination Results. Hide or Show the current page number and total pages (e.g., "Page 1 of 2") at the bottom of each page. Use Global will use the default value from the component options.

Article Options

The Featured Articles Layout has the following Article Options, as shown below. These options determine how the articles will show in the blog layout.

In addition to Yes/No or Hide/Show, these options allow the following settings.

Use Article Settings: Use the value from the Article Manager Edit. This setting allows you to have different options for different articles in the blog layout. For example, one article could show the author and other articles could hide the author.

The Article Options are as follows.

Show Title. (Use Global/Use Article Settings/Hide/Show). Whether or not to show the Article's Title.

Linked Titles. (Use Global/Use Article Settings/No/Yes). If the Article's Title is shown, whether to show it as a link to the article.

Show Intro Text. (Use Global/Use Article Settings/Hide/Show). If set to Show, the Intro Text of the article will show when you drill down to the article. If set to Hide, only the part of the article after the "Read More" break will show.

Show Category. (Use Global/Use Article Settings/Hide/Show). Whether or not to show the Article's Category.

Link Category. (Use Global/Use Article Settings/No/Yes). If the Article's Category is shown, whether to show it as a link to a Category layout (list or blog) for that Category.

Show Parent. (Use Global/Use Article Settings/Hide/Show). Whether or not to show the Article's Parent Category.

Link Parent. (Use Global/Use Article Settings/No/Yes). If the Article's Parent Category is shown, whether to show it as a link to a Category layout (list or blog) for that Category.

Show Author. (Use Global/Use Article Settings/Hide/Show) Whether to show the author of the Article.

Link Author. (Use Global/Use Article Settings/No/Yes). If the Article's author is shown, whether to show it as a link to a Contact layout for that author. Note that the author must be set up as a Contact in Contact Manager: Edit.

Show Create Date. (Use Global/Use Article Settings/Hide/Show). Whether or not to show the Article's create date.

Show Modify Date. (Use Global/Use Article Settings/Hide/Show). Whether or not to show the Article's modify date.

Show Publish Date. (Use Global/Use Article Settings/Hide/Show). Whether or not to show the Article's start publishing date.

Show Navigation. (Use Global/Use Article Settings/Hide/Show). Whether or not to show a navigation link (for example, Next or Previous article) when you drill down to the article.

Show Voting. (Use Global/Use Article Settings/Hide/Show). Whether or not to show the a voting icon for the article.

Show Read More. (Use Global/Hide/Show). Whether or not to show a "Read More" link to allow a drill down to the entire article.

Show Title with Read More. (Use Global/Hide/Show). If set to Show, the Article's title will show in the "Read More" button.

Show Icons. (Use Global/Use Article Settings/Hide/Show). If set to Show, Print and Email will use icons instead of text.